Kameron Hurley

Nominated for the 2012 Nebula Award. All page numbers from the trade paperback first edition published by Night Shade Books

She had already been to hell. One prayer more or less wouldn’t make any difference.

Chapter 1 (p. 6).

A well-appointed prison is still a prison.

Chapter 4 (p. 42).

Not everything that’s beautiful is weak.

Chapter 7 (p. 68).

“How can you read such a beautiful book and turn your back on it?”
“Never said it wasn’t a beautiful book. I just don’t believe there’s some man up there in the black who gets off on watching us pound our head on the pavement six times a day.

Chapter 8 (p. 78).

Countries at war lived in a state of perpetual fear.

Chapter 26 (p. 197).

I’d say I was doing a great job submitting to God by submitting to my desires. Who do you think gave me desire in the first place?

Chapter 29 (p. 220).

The world could burn around her, the cities turn to dust, the cries of a hundred thousand fill the air, and she would get up after the fire died and walk barefoot and burned over the charred soil in search of clean water, a weapon, a purpose. She would rebuild.

Chapter 31 (p. 231).

“We have a war to fight. You don’t understand. We fight in God’s name.”
“I understand just fine,” Nyx said.

Chapter 32 (p. 235).

It wasn’t what was done to you. Life was what you did with what was done to you.

Chapter 32 (p. 240).

Don’t confuse rescue and kidnapping. I have not asked to be rescued.

Chapter 34 (p. 252).

You could stand near him, listen to him speak, and feel as if you were in the presence of some wiser man, a true mullah. His uncles were the same. Rich, powerful men whose influence allowed them to profit from the war, not fight in it.

Chapter 38 (p. 277).

“Nyxnissa?”
She looked back at the queen. “There are no happy endings, Nyxnissa.”
“I know,” Nyx said. “Life keeps going.”